32 

/ 1 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



017 136 354 8 



HoUinger Corp. 
DH8.5 



F 352 
.H29 
Copy 1 



THE VIRGINIANS ON THE 
OHIO AND THE MISSISSIPPI IN 1742 



By Fairfax Harrison 



f^ 



,^;!.r 



VIRGINIANS ON THE OHIO AND MISSISSIPPI, 1/42 203 



THE VIRGINIANS ON THE OHIO AND THE 
MISSISSIPPI IN 1742 



By Fairfax Harrison. 



In his History of the Valley of Virginia, first published in 
1833,^ Samuel Kercheval recorded a tradition he had from a 
Valley pioneer, William Heath, of Hardy, that "a man by the 
name of John Howard, and his son, previous to the first settle- 
ment of our Valley, explored the country and discovered the 
charming Valley of the South Branch, crossed the Alleghany 
Mountains and on the Ohio killed a very large buffalo bull, 
skinned him, stretched his hide over ribs of wood, made a 
kind of boat, and in this frail bark descended the Ohio and 
Mississippi to New Orleans, where they were apprehended by 
the French as suspicious characters and sent to France, but 
nothing criminal appearing against them, they were discharged. 
From hence they crossed over to England." 

The early historians of western exploration generally ig- 
nored this story, though some of them mentioned it only to 
scout it.^ But there was other testimony for Howard. Dr. 
L. C. Draper and Mr. Thwaites^ both found references in 
eighteenth century English books, to "reports of the Virginia 
government" which they accepted as establishing the fact that 

^ The quotation will be found on p. 47 of the more accessible (but 
still unindexed) edition of 1902. 

' e. g., DeHass, Western Virginia, 1851, p. 48; Shaler, Kentucky, 
1885. p. 59- . 

* R. G. Thwaites' France in America (Hart's American Nation Se- 
ries), 1905, p. 40, citing a note by the anonymous English translator of 
LePage DuPratz Histoirc de la Louisianc (originally published in Paris, 
1758, the translation appearing in London, 1763, of which edition see for 
the reference to "Howard and Sallee," i, 105) and a brief quotation, in 
J. H. Wynne, British Empire in America (1770, ii, 405). from the re- 
port of "those who were sent from Virginia in 1742 on purpose to 
survey" the Mississippi. Dr. Draper's earlier investigations on the sub- 
ject were printed in 1914 in Mississippi Valley Historical Review, i, 262. 



204 VIRGINIA HISTORICAL MAGAZINE 

Virginians named "Howard and Sallee" were on the Missis- 
sippi in 1742. In 1893, Mr. W. M. Darlington* printed, 
apparently from the Clarke transcripts made in the Public 
Record Office, London, a calendar of the Salley document, 
which is here presented, but he did not attempt to confirm it, 
nor, indeed, did he even comment upon it in his exhaustive 
review of the eighteenth century explorations out of Virginia, 
which preceded Christopher Gist's journey to the Ohio in 1750. 
Standing alone, stripped of the official reports which testified 
to its provenance, this paper was not convincing. Justin Win- 
sor hesitated to accept it. "If the evidence is not to be dis- 
puted," he says,"* "John Howard ♦ * * was perhaps the first 
on the English part to travel the whole course of one of the 
great ramifications of the Valley. * * * An air of circum- 
stantiality is given to the expedition in the journal of John 
Peter Salley, who was one of Howard's companions." Mr. 
Winsor's caution was justified also by the confusion in the 
Virginia folk traditions of the adventures of one called John 
Sailing, on the inconsistencies of which the most judicious of 
the historians of the Valley of Virginia, Mr. J. A. Waddell* 
had already animadverted. These tales, told on winter even- 
ings around border firesides, were preserved by Withers.' 
Foote,' Campbell," and Schuricht j'*' while Dr. L. C. Draper" 
had taken down in 1848, from statements by "descendants of 
John Peter Sailing." a curious farrago of them all, elaborated 
with new detail. 

* In an appendix to his edition of Christopher Gists Journals ( Pitts- 
burgh, 1893), p. 253. The Clarke transcripts had then been calendared 
in Fernow, The Ohio Valley in Colonial Days (Albany, 1890) with a 
reference only, at p. 260, to "an account of John P. Salley's travels." 

^ The Mississippi Basin, 1895, p. 318. The source of the "evidence" 
is not cited. 

' Jnuals of Augusta. 1886 and 1902, p. 23. 

'Border Warfare, 1831, p. 42. This, the most circumstantial, assigns 
to John Sailing six years of captivity among the Cherokees with inci- 
dental travels from Canada to Florida. Winsor (Mississippi Basin, pp. 
168, 179) apparently accepted this tradition as more probable than the 
one of the New Orleans journey, if, indeed, he appreciated that Sailing 
and Salley were the same man. 

^Sketches of Virginia, 2d Series, 1855, p. 26. 

"History of Virginia, i860, p. 427. 

" The German Element in Virginia, 1898, i, 86. 

"See Mr. Thwaites' note, based on Dr. Draper's MS, at p. 48 of his 
edition (1895) of Withers' Border Warfare. 



Ira.,;,,. ,rAd ffu^ 
' " •-r^'^o'* OffJci, 



VIRGINIANS ON THE OHIO AND MISSISSIPPI, 1 742 20$ 

The one fact which could be taken to be established by this 
kind of testimony was that in the early days of the Augusta 
frontier, one John Peter Salley (or Sailing) had gone thence 
on a far journey into the mysterious wilderness; but, fortu- 
nately for the credit of a good story, Kercheval's informant 
may now be corroborated by following up the clews. 

The contemporary record begins with the Executive Jour- 
nal of the Virginia Council :" 

October ij, I7S7- 

"John Howard, by his Petition setting forth that he, to- 
gether with divers other Inhabitants on Sherrando River, are 
willing at their own charge to go upon discoveries on the Lakes 
& River of Mississippi, and praying a Commission for that 
purpose, it is accordingly Ordered that a Commission be 
granted the said Howard to Command such men as shall be 
willing to accompany him on such discovery, but with this 
caution that he don't offer any Hostility to any Indians or 
others he may happen to meet with nor go to any ffort or 
Garrison possess'd by the ffrench on the said Lakes or River." 

November ^, 1737. 

"Ordered, That there be furnished to Mr. John Howard 40 
lbs. powder & a proportonable quantity of bullets out of His 
Majesties Stores & four Kettles for the better enabling him 
to perform the Service in making discoveries towards the River 
Mississippi." 

The Gooch Papers^ develop the details. Here it appears 
that when, in May, 1751, in pursuance of Governor Gooch's 
long nursed plan to provide an adequate map of Virginia, 
Joshua Fry and Peter Jefiferson produced the first draft of the 
well-known map bearing their names. Col. Fry accompanied 
it with "An Account of the Bounds of the Colony of Vir- 
ginia & of its back settlements, & of the lands towards the 

" Va. Mag., xiv, 9, 16. 

"British transcripts in the Library of Congress. 



206 VIRGINIA HISTORICAL MAGAZINE 

Mountains & Lakes" which was transmitted with the MS. map 
to the Lords of Trade by President Lewis Burwell, then act- 
ing Heutenant governor." In this paper Fry states that he 
had based his depiction of the western waters and lands partly 
on conversations with his neighbour, Dr. Thomas Walker, of 
Albemarle, who had just returned from his explorations in 
Kentucky," and partly on information derived from one John 
Peter Salley, described as "a German who lives in the County 
of Augusta in Virginia," Incidentally, Fry made a transcript 
of Salley's journal for 1742-1745," in which were rehearsed 
his adventures on a wilderness journey with John Howard, 
under a commission from the Virginia government, which had 
taken them down the rivers New, Coal (which Salley named), 
Kanawha, Ohio and Mississippi and lead to their capture by 
the French, and imprisonment at New Orleans. Commenting 
upon this journal at large. Fry appended it to the copy of his 
Account, which was sent to London, where it constituted that 
"report of the Virginia government" which was read by the 
translator of DuPratz, by John Huddlestone Wynne and doubt- 
by others who had access to the papers of the Board of Trade. 

"See Burwell's despatch of 21 August, 1751, C. O. 5: 1327, L. C. 
Transcripts, p. 355 ff. 

^" Dr. Walker's Journal of his explorations in 1750, edited by WilHam 
Cabell Rives, was printed in Boston, 1888. It was Dr. Walker who was 
selected in 1753 to lead the proposed expedition out of Virginia to 
explore the Missouri for a "carry" to the waters of the Pacific which 
was prevented by the outbreak of hostilities with the French in 1754. 
See James Maury in Memoirs of a Huguenot Family, Putnam's re- 
print, p. 391. 

"Salley permitted others also to copy his journal. Mr. Thwaites 
says (in the note in his edition of Withers Bonier Warfare), "Sailing 
kept a journal which was extant in 1745, for in the Wisconsin Histori- 
cal Society's library is a diary kept by Capt. John Buchanan, who notes 
that in that year he spent two days in copying a part of it." Dr. John 
Mitchell, the Virginia botanist, also had seen it and made use of it in 
drawing that great map of 1755 on which the British government subse- 
quently placed so much reliance. In his "Remarks on the Journal of 
Batts and Fallam" (Alvord, I'irst Explorations, p. 204), Dr. Mitchell 
says "in 1739 or 1740 [sic] a Party of People were sent out by the 
Government of Virginia and traversed the whole Countrcy down Wood 
River and the River Ohio to the Missisipi and down that River to New 
Orleans: whose journals I have seen and perused and have made a 
draught of the countrey from them and tind they agree with other and 
later accounts." 



VIRGINIANS ON THE OHIO AND MISSISSIPPI, 1 742 20/ 

Finally, there is now confirmation from the French side." 
In 1742 LeMoyne de Bienville, the "father" of Louisiana, was 
at the end of his forty years of service on behalf of that col- 
ony. Having fallen into disfavor at Court, he had asked for 
his recall from his arduous duty as Governor, and was await- 
ing the arrival of a successor. The French colony was in 
domestic difficulties, and, through the diplomacy of James 
Adair, of Carolina, had recently been embroiled with its nearest 
Indian neighbours, the Choctaws. In this situation, a convoy 
returning down stream from the Illinois, captured Howard, 
Salley and their companions on the Mississippi, about one 
hundred and twenty miles above Natchez. In a despatch of 
30 July, 1742, Bienville reports that his examination of the 
prisoners indicated that 

"they had been sent on their perilous journey for the pur- 
pose of exploring the rivers flowing from Virginia into the 
Mississippi, and to reconnoiter the terrain looking to estab- 
lishing a settlement, for the English pretend that their bound- 
aries extend as far as the bank of the Mississippi. I have 
thought fit to have this affair investigated by a mixed council 
of military and civil officers to obviate misunderstandings 
among our own people and to allay the alarm excited by an 
enterprise which, though bold, after all was foolhardy. M. de 
Salmon has entered in our joint report on this subject his 
opinion that these five men were not alone, and that they had 
a rendezvous with the Indians. If they had been from Caro- 
lina I would agree with him, but the Virginians have no such 
knowledge of the country or of the tribes which dwell here 
as to have made such a rendezvous. Whatever may be the 
fact in this respect it is important that these rash men shall 

" Gayarre (History of Louisiana, 1885, i, 523) mentioned the incident, 
and on that clew the despatches on which he relied have been found 
among the French transcripts recently acquired by the Library of Con- 
gress. The references are Archives Nationales, Colonics, O^ A, 28 
folios 6, 71, 191, 273. Cordial acknowledgment is made to Dr. J. Frank- 
lin Jameson, Director of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, for 
calling attention to the availability of these documents. 

It is probable that among the still undigested records of the French 
regime in Louisiana, now in the Cabildo at New Orleans, more may be 
found on the subject. Mr. Henry P. Dart, of the New Orleans bar, is 
making a gallant effort to arouse public opinion in Louisiana to the 
advantage of editing this cache of historical material. 



208 VIRGINIA HISTORICAL MAGAZINE 

not return home to bear witness of what they have learned 
among us. I shall send them to the fort at Natchitoches, 
whence I will have them escorted to the mines of New Mexico." 

In February, 1743, Bienville reported again that the diffi- 
culty of sending the prisoners safely to New Mexico had de- 
termined him to await the arrival of his successor (Vaudreuil) 
before disposing of them and, in July, 1743, Vaudreuil in 
turn reports that there is danger that the prisoner may escape, 
wherefore he asked permssion to send them to France. On 
this despatch is annotated agreement by an official of the 
home government, "Lcs rcnvoycr en France," and the final 
entry is a despatch b}' Vaudreuil of 29 December, 1744, re- 
porting that two of the Virginian prisoners had escaped and the 
other three have been sent to France. 

The details of the story are told in the principal documents 
here reproduced. We begin with a petition which John 
Howard (or, as the French transcript makes him sign him- 
self, Hayward) wrote in prison in New Orleans, and to which 
he added the names of his companions. Doubtless he planned 
to have this paper smuggled out by a friendly hand and put 
in the way to reach England. That it is now available is due 
to the fact that it was intercepted by Vaudreuil, translated 
into French and forwarded to Paris. What follows is a trans- 
lation of this translation, turning it back into English : 

"To his Royal Majesty, George II, by the Grace of 
God, King of Great Britain, of all the lands thereon 
depending, including America, and Defender of the 
Faith. 

"May it please your Royal Majesty: 

"I, John Hayward, your very humble subject, have been an 
inhabitant in the most western part of Virginia, where we 
were continually exposed to the fury of unknown savages, 
who more than a hundred times and in different places have 
murdered the subjects of your Majesty, Deeming for this 
reason that neither I nor my neighbours were safe, I con- 
sidered that the best means of remedying this our condition 
was to go to visit these natives and to make a treaty with 



VIRGINIANS ON THE OHIO AND MISSISSIPPI, I742 20g 

them. I went accordingly to consult with our Governor and, 
having laid before him my reasons, he commissioned me to 
enlist a small company of volunteers to go into the back parts 
of Virginia, as far as the River Mississipy, there to visit the 
indians who lived in those parts to make peace with them and 
so establish a durable treaty. A commission was made out 
accordingly. This enterprise having been abandoned for rea- 
sons which it would be tiresome to relate, I returned to my 
home. But the savages continuing their inhuman murders 
and having killed six of my neighbors in one day in a meet- 
ing house, I informed the Governor of this accident, where- 
upon he gave me a new commission and sent me after the mur- 
derers in the direction of the highest branches of the river 
Mississippy. There I found several indian nations by whom 
I was informed that those who had struck the blow were of 
their people (I saw the scalps of those they had killed), and 
that the murderers, fearing we would take vengeance, had jfled 
towards the lakes. Some of them were taken and punished. 

"Not trusting in the safety either of myself or my neigh- 
bours, I determined then to carry out the journey originally 
planned, and, our Governor being called away by reason of 
the war with Spain,^ I made use accordingly of my original 
commission, which was still in force, and set out on March 
8, 1742. I continued my journey until July the fourth, when 
we were arrested by seventy frenchmen, who conducted us to 
a town called New Orleans, near the mouth of the Mississipy. 
There we were closely examined by the Governor" and were 
grievously accused that our purpose had been to spy out the 
way for an army to come to destroy them and their country. 
Nothing appearing against us to support this charge, except 
weak suspicions, we hoped to be put at liberty, but on the 
contrary were condemned to three years in prison. And I 
verily believe that [if left to their mercies] we will not be 

'* As appears from his despatches Governor Gooch was absent from 
Virginia, in command of the American troops in the Carthagena expe- 
dition only from October 2, 1740, until the end of March, 1741. He 
returned wounded and sick leaving what he called his "little army" 
of Americans in Cuba. It must have been by reason of his physical 
condition that Howard was unable to see him again before setting out 
on his expedition. 

" Bienville. 



2IO VIRGINIA HISTORICAL MAGAZINE 

released until death has pity on us. To that fate we have indeed 
already been very near, partly by reason of the darkness of 
our dungeons and partly by reason of the bad food given us. 
But God having pity has restored our strength. And yet up 
to this moment we have no hope for our deliverance except in 
the Wisdom and Charity of your Majesty, our lives being as 
a sacrifice in the hands of cruel men. 

"That your Royal Majesty and your blessed family may 
continue to enjoy the love of God, our Celestial father, by 
the merit of our Redeemer, Jesus Christ, and the Consolation 
of the Holy Ghost, is and continually shall be the prayers of 
your humble subjects whose names are subscribed. 

"John Hayward 
Josias Hayward, my Son 
John Patteet 
John Peter Sailing 
Charles Cinekler. 

"New Orleans, June 21, 1743. 

"In consideration of our deplorable condition, we ask par- 
don for our bad writing." 

We shall see that eventually Salley escaped, so that Howard 
was of those sent to France by Vaudreuil in December, 1744. 
The Heath tradition as to his subsequent adventures is varied 
in detail, but in substance confirmed by a statement by Col. 
Fry in his Account, viz : "Howard and his men had been con- 
fined a long time at New Orleans, when, after the French war 
broke out, he and one or two of them were shipped for France, 
but in the Voyage were taken by an English ship and carryed 
to London, where I suppose he gave a fuller account of his 
Expedition than I can collect from an imperfect Journal." 
There is no evidence that Howard made any report in London, 
nor of what became of him. Unfortunately, there is no such 
local record for him in Virginia as there is for Salley." 

" There was an Irish family named Howard living in Stafford in 
1692 when one "Thomas Howard, cooper," administered upon the estate 
of a kinsman of the same name (Stafford records. MS.) 

There was a John Howard who served on the first Grand Jury of 



VIRGINIANS ON THE OHIO AND MISSISSIPPI, I742 211 

We come next to Salley's Journal as Fry transcribed and 
commented on it. Tested not only by the confirmatory docu- 
ments, but by the topography and incidental references, this 
seems now amply to bear out the confidence which both Col. 
Fry and Dr. John Mitchell placed in it. 

A Brief Account of the Travels of John Peter Salley, 

A German Who Lives in the County of Augusta 

IN Virginia. 

It may be necessary before I enter upon the particular pas- 
sage of my Travels, to inform my Reader, that what they are 
to meet with in the following Narrative, is only what I re- 
tained in my Memory ; For when we were taken by the French 
we were robbed of all our papers, that contained any writ- 
ings relative to our Travels. 

1740. In the year 1740, I came from Pennsylvania to that 
part of Orange County now called Augusta; and settled in a 
fork of James River close under the Blue Ridge of Mountains 
on the West Side, where I now live.^' 

Orange county in 1735 and was surveyor of the road "from the Chap- 
pie Road to the Rapidan Cave's Ford" (Scott Orange County, 29, 30). 
He may have been our man but as we have seen he was living on 
"Sherando" river in 1737. Mr. Cartmel says (Shenandoah Valley 
Pioneers, pp. 475. 482) that there was an Irish family of Howards 
living in Frederick from the earliest settlement of the Valley. If our 
man returned to Virginia he may have been the "John Howard of the 
county of Frederick" who on May 16, 1753, had a grant of a lot in 
Winchester (Northern Neck Grant Book, H 382). The John Howard 
who appears in Chalkley's Abstracts from 1764 to 1768, in association 
with the Capt. John Buchanan who copied Salley's journal, seems to 
have been of a younger generation. 

^John Peter Salley had a patent (Virginia Land Register, xix, 997) 
dated July 6, 1741, for 400 acres "in that part of Orange County called 
Augusta in the first fork of James River on the West side of the blue 
Ridge of Mountains." Fry identified the site with Salley's name on 
his map, at a point on James River just above Balcony Falls, in what 
is now Rockbridge. It appears from Chalkley, Abstracts from the Rec- 
ords of Augusta County. Virginia (1912), that the author of the Jour- 
nal was a member of Capt. John McDowell's company before his ex- 
pedition with Howard. (The muster roll among the Preston Papers 
in the Wisconsin Historical Society, printed by Chalkley, ii, 507, is 
not dated but is related by Waddell to 1742. The fact that Salley is 
on it would indicate that it must have been made before March, 1741/2.) 
and, in 1746, after his return, "qualified as Captain of Foot." (Au- 
gusta Order Book, i, 135.) In February, 1747/8, he had his lands 
processioned and, after several real estate transactions and a suit for 



212 VIRGINIA HISTORICAL MAGAZINE 

1741/2. In the month of March, 1741/2 One John Howard 
came to my house, and told me, that he had received a Commis- 
sion from our Governor to travel to the westward of this 
Colony, as far as the River Mississippi, in order to make Dis- 
covery of the Country, and that as a regward for his Labour, 
he had the promise of an Order of Council for Ten Thou- 
sand Acres of Land ; and at the same time obliged himself to 
give equal Shares of said Land to such men as would go in 
Comi^any with him to search the Country as above. Where- 
upon I and other two men, Vizt [John Poteat] and Charles 
Sinclair" (his own Son Josiah Harwood having already joined 
with him) entered into Covenant with him, binding ourselves 
to each other in a certain writing, and accordingly prepared 
for our Journey in a very unlucky hour to me and my poor 
Family. 

breach of promise of marriage on behalf of a daughter, died in 1755, 
leaving a will dated 25 December, 1754 (proved 19 March, 1755, 
Augusta W. B., ii. pp. 92, iii, 124). Two of his sons. George Adam 
and John, who took the James River lands under the will sold them in 
1760 and 1762, describing themselves at first as "of Cumberland County, 
North Carolina," and later, "of Orange County, North Carolina." 
(Augusta D. B., ix, 25; xi, 34.) 

The "descendants of John Peter Sailing" who made statements in 
1848 for Dr. Draper, lived in Rockbridge, but Dr. Draper recorded 
that others were then living in Tennessee and Kentucky who spelled 
their name Sallee. In the Augusta records it is spelled variously Salley, 
Sally and Sailing. 

Whatever was the original name our John Peter was undoubtedly 
one of the Switzers who came to Virginia through Pennsylvania as a 
consequence of the activities of Michel and Graffenried (Va. Mag. 
xxix, I) and must be distinguished from that Pierre (or Peter) Salle 
who was peacefully baptizing children in the Huguenot colony at Mana- 
kintown during the years John Peter was absent on his travels (Brock 
Huguenot Emigration to Virginia. 1886, pp. 103, 113). 

Mr. A. S. Salley, Jr., of the Historical Commission of South Caro- 
lina, advises that the Salley family of that State descends from Henry 
Salley. who had lands laid out for him in Orangeburgh Township in 
1735, or sometime before John Peter says he left Pennsylvania. 

** In the Fry transcript a blank was left for the name preceding 
that of Sinclair. We have supplied "Poteat" from the Howard peti- 
tion, where in the French text it is spelled "Putteet." In Chalkley's 
Abstracts (iii, 252) there appears, under date of 6 February, 1745/6, 
an assignment of an interest in lands on the South P> ranch of James 
River (i. e., near Salley's) by "John Pateet of Frederick County, yeo- 
man," to "Charles Sinckler, laborer." These are undoubtedly our men 
after they had respectively returned to Virginia. In 1753 (Chalkley, 
iii. 309) James Patton conveys other lands on James River to "John Pe- 
tect," while later references to Sinclair in the Augusta records indicate 
that he followed the western movement of the frontier down New 
River. 



VIRGINIANS ON THE OHIO AND MISSISSIPPI, I742 213 

1741/2. On the sixteenth of March, 1742, we set off from 
my House and went to Cedar Creek about five miles, where 
is a Natural Bridge over said Creek, reaching from the Hill on 
the one side to the Hill on the other. It is a solid Rock and is 
two hundred and three feet high, having a very large Spacious 
arch, where the Water runs thro',^ we then proceeded as far 
as Mondongachate, now called Woods River ,^ which is eighty- 
five Miles, where we killed five Buffoloes, and with their hides 
covered the Frame of a Boat f^ which was so large as to carry 
all our Company, and all our provisions and Utensfls, with 
which we passed down the said River two hundred and fifty- 
two miles as we supposed,^' and found it very Rocky, having 
a great many Falls therein, one of which we computed to be 
thirty feet perpendicular and all along surrounded with inac- 
cessible Mountains, high precipices, which obliged us to leave 
said River.^ We went then a south west course by Land 
eighty five Miles, where we came to a small River,** and there 
we made a little Boat, which carried only two men and our 
provisions. The rest travelled by Land for two Days and then 
we came to a large River, where we enlarged our Barge, so 
as she carried all our Company, and whatever Loading we had 
to put into her. We supposed that we went down this River 
Two Hundred and Twenty Miles, and had a tolerable good 
passage ; there being only two places, that were difficult by 
reason of Falls. Where we came to this River the Country 
is mountainous, but the farther down the plainer in those Moun- 
tains, we found great plenty of Coals, for which we named 

^ This seems to be the earliest description of the Natural Bridge. It 
is curious that Fry did not mark it on his map. 

^ Fry notes here in the margin, "The New River." For the discovery 
of this river in 1671 when it was named for Col. Abraham Wood of 
Fort Henry (Petersburg) see Alvord, first Explorations, 1912. 

""This device may be a testimony of Howard's origin. Irish fisher- 
men still use coracles made with the hides of bullocks. 

^ Salley's distances do not bear critical analysis. One can understand 
that they seemed greater to him than they do to a traveller in a Pull- 
man car. 

"It was a wise decision. In Fayette County, says Martin {Gazetteer 
of Virginia, 1836), New River "is borne down with so much force and 
precipitancy as to render its crossing hazardous . . . the falls 
being so rapidly successive as to resemble artificial steps." 

^ The northeast fork of Coal River. ^"" 



214 VIRGINIA HISTORICAL MAGAZINE 

it Coal River."* Where this River and Woods river meets" the 
North Mountains end, and the Country appears very plain and 
is well water'd, there are plenty of Rivulets, clear Fountains 
and running Streams and very fertile Soil. From the mouth 
of Coal River, to the River Alleghany we computed to be 
ninety two miles, and on the sixth day of May we came to 
Allegany which we supposed to be three Quarters of a mile, 
[broad]"*' and from here to the great Falls on this River is 
reckoned four hundred and forty four Miles, there being a 
large Spacious open Country on each side of the River, and is 
well watered abounding with plenty of Fountains small streams 
and large Rivers; and is very high and fertile Soil. At this 
Time we found the Clover to be as high as the middle of a 
man's leg. In general all the Woods over the Land is Ridgey, 
but plain, well timbered and hath plenty of all kind of Wood, 
that grows in Common with us in this Colony (excepting 
pine). The Falls'" mentioned above are three miles long in 
which is a small Island, the body of the Stream running on 
the North side, through which is no passing by reason of 
great Rocks and large Whirlpools, by which we went down 
on the south side of said Island without much Danger or 
Difficulty and in time of a Fresh in the River, men may pass 
either up or down, they being active or careful. About twenty 
Miles below the Falls the Land appeared to be somewhat Hilly 
the Ridges being higher, and continued so for the Space of 

* With this description compare Martin. "Coal Rover . . .is 
about ICO yards wide at its mouth and does not vary this width for 
many miles above. It is a beautiful meandering stream w'hich runs 
through a romantic Valley, without receiving any tributary of conse- 
quence from the juncture of its northeast and west fork until it re- 
ceives Little Coal River [Louisa] from the south. . . . The lower 
falls are situated five miles above the mouth and five miles above these 
are the upper falls." The "romantic Valley" is now black with col- 
lieries and railroads. Fry misspelled the name "Cole" on his map and 
was followed on several of the later maps. As a result, that spelling 
may still be encountered occasionally. 

™ Below Charleston, W. Va., so that at this confluence Salley's 
"Woods River" was the Great Kanawha. 

"The Ohio at the mouth of the Great Kanawha (Point Pleasant) 
where, in August, 1749, Celeron de Bienville planted one of his plates, 
"pour monument du renouvellcmcnt de possession que nous avons pris 
de la ditte Riviere Oyo." One would like to know Celeron's authority 
for his "renouvellement." 

"The falls of the Ohio at Louisville. 



VIRGINIANS ON THE OHIO AND MISSISSIPPI, I742 315 

fifty Miles down the River, but neither Rocky nor Stony, but 
a rich Soil as is above mentioned. Joyning this high Land 
below is a very level flat Country on both sides of the River, 
and is so for an Hundred and fifty Miles, abounding with all 
the advantages mentioned above, and a much richer Soil ; 
We then met with a kind of Ridge that seemed to Extend 
across the Country as far as we could view and bore North 
and South. In Seven Miles we passed it, when we found the 
Country level (as is mentioned before), but not having such 
plenty of running Streams, yet a richer Soil. On the seventh 
day of June we entered into the River Missi^ippi, which we 
computed to be five miles wide, and yet in some places it is 
not above one mile over, having in most places very high 
Banks, and in other places it overflows. The current is not 
swift but easy to pass either up or down, and in all our pas^ 
sage we found great plenty of Fish, and wild fowl in abund- 
ance. In the River Missi^ippi above the mouth of Allegany"" 
is a large Island on which are three Towns inhabited by the 
French,"" who maintain Commerce and Trade both with the 

^ Fry notes in the margin "Ouabache" and in his Account comments : 
"The River Alleghany heads with Susquehanna and the water of the 
lakes and running Southwesterly receives the Streams from the Alle- 
gany Ridge that way as the New River, coming from the South, does 
those Southward, and zvherc flicy meet they compose the River Oua- 
bache, named by the French, St. Jerome." President Burwell testified 
that Fry had retired from William and Mary College "to the back 
Settlements [Albemarle] in Order to raise a Fortune for his Family." 
This, then, was the motive of his dreams of the west which actuated 
the remainder of his life. He made what was in the Virginia of his 
time an unusual collection of material about New France. James 
Maury (Memoirs of a Huguenot Family, Putnam's reprint, p. 390) 
says that he had a copy of Daniel Coxe's Carolana (published 1722, 1726, 
1727 and 1741) and so, of course, knew Coxe's map of the Mississippi, 
but the statement quoted above shows other and better knowledge of 
the Ohio. It seems likely from what he says that Fry had before him 
a copy of Herman Moll's "New Map of the North Part of America 
claimed by France," 1720, the legend of which declares that "the South- 
west part of Louisiana is done after a French Map Published at Paris 
in 1718." Here the Ohio is laid down with approximate correctness, if 
without convincing land marks and, although Coxe had called it by its 
Indian name, "Hohio," is marked "Ouabach, now called by the French 
R. St. Jerome." The Great Kanawha is sketched in vaguely as "Sault 
R.", and the true Wabash is indicated still more vaguely but not named. 
The Tennessee River is shown emptying into the Mississippi below the 
mouth of the Ohio and is marked "Cusatees or Thegategos R." i. e., 
Cherokee River. 

** Fry comments : "This as well as his account of the Salt Work and 
Lead Mine he had from information after he was taken for they did 
not go up the River." The island was Kaskaskia. 



2l6 VIRGINIA HISTORICAL MAGAZINE 

French of Cannada, and those French on the mouth of the 
said River. In the fork between Allegany and IMissii'ippi are 
certain Salt Springs, where the Inhabitants of the Towns men- 
tioned above make their Salt. Also they have there a very 
rich Lead Mine which they have opened and it affords them 
a Considerable gain.''' From the Falls mentioned above in the 
River Allegany to the mouth of said River is four Hundred 
fifty Miles, from thence to the Town of New Orleans is One 
Thousand four Hundred and ten Miles, and is Uninhabited 
excepting fifty Leagues above New Orleans. It is a large 
spacious plain Country endowed with all the natural Advan- 
tages, that is a moderate healthy Climate, Sweet water, rich 
Soil, and a pure fresh Air, which contribute to the Benefit of 
Mankind. We held on our passage down the River Mississippi 
[ until j the second day of July, and about nine o' the Clock in 
the Morning we went on Shore to cook our Breakfast. But we 
were suddenly surprised by a Company of Men,"" Viz.' to the 
Number of Ninety, Consisting of French men Negroes, & 
Indians, who took us prisoners and carried us to the Town of 

^ Fry comments : "Monsieur Joutel in his Journal takes notice of a 
Salt Spring which his Indian Guides showed him between the Mouths 
of Ouabache and the River Islinois and that I suppose is the Place 
where the French make Salt. These French Towns, Salt Work and 
Lead Mine, must be in Virginia." 

Joutel was one of the companions of LaSalle on his last fatal expe- 
dition to Texas in 1684 and returned via Fort St. Louis on the Illinois 
in 1687. (See Parkman, LaSalle.) His Journal Historiquc was pub- 
lished in Paris, 1713; an English translation appeared the following 
year and was reprinted in 17 19. Fry evidently had a copy of one of 
these editions. Joutel is included in French's Historical Collections of 
Louisiana, i, 183, and should be read with Dumont's continuation {ibid., 
V, i) which describes the Illinois fort in 1753. Moll's map (1720) indi- 
cates "French Factory" at the mouth of the "Ilinese R." and lower 
down on the Missouri side of the Mississippi "Salt R." with "Salt 
Magazine [i. e. Ste Genevieve] and the general description, "This whole 
County is full of Mines." 

"" Fry comments : "The men who took them came from that Settle- 
ment [the Illinois] in a Fleet of Small Craft guarded by an armed 
Schooner because the Chcrokees and other Indians at War with the 
French sometimes intercept them on the Mississippi." 

As it happens, wc have a graphic record of such an adventure, the 
very year before Howard and Sallcy were on the Mississippi, in the 
Journal of Antoine Bonnefoy (Mereness, Travels in the Atnerican Col- 
onies, 1916, p. 241). In 1741 he was intercepted by the Cherokees while 
making his way from New Orleans to the Illinois and was carried up 
the Tennessee River to captivity in the Western North Carolina moun- 
tains. 



VIRGINIANS ON THE OHIO AND MISSISSIPPI, I742 217 

New Orleans, which was about one Hundred Leagues from 
us when we were taken, and after being examined upon Oath 
before the Governor" first separately one by One, and then 
All together, we were committed to close Prison, we not know- 
ing then (nor even yet) how long they intended to confine 
us there. During our stay in Prison we had allowed us a 
pound and half of Bread a man each Day, and Ten pound of 
pork p Month for each man. Which allowance was duly given 
to us for the space of Eighteen Months, and after that we had 
only one pound of Rice Bread, and one pound of Rice for each 
man p Day, and one Quart of Bear's Oil for each man p. 
Month, which allowance was continued to us untill I made my 
Escape. Whilst I was confined in Prison I had many Visits 
made to me by the French and Dutch who lived there, and grew 
intimate and familiar with some of them, by whom I was in- 
formed of the Manner of Government, Laws, Strength and 
Wealth of the Kingdom of Louisiana as they call it, and from 
the whole we learned, that the Government is Tyrannical, The 
Common People groan under the Load of Oppression, and Sigh 
for Deliverance. The Governor is the Chief Merchant, and in- 
hances all the trade into his own hands, depriving the Planters 
of selling their Commodities to any other, but himself, and 
allowing them only such prices as he pleases.** And with re- 
spect to Religion, there's little to be found amongst them, but 
those who profess any Religion at all, it's the Church of Rome. 
In the Town are nine Clergymen four Jesuits and five Ca- 
puchin Friers. They have likewise one Nunnery in which are 
nine Nuns. Notwithstanding the Fertility and Richness of the 
Soil, The Inhabitants are generally poor as a Consequence of 
the Oppression they meet with from their Rulers, neither is 
the Settling of the Country, or Agriculture in any Measure 
encouraged by the Legislature. — One thing I had almost for- 
got. Viz.' we were told by some of the French who first set- 
tled there, that about forty years ago, when the French first 

'^ Bienville. 

^All this seems to be mere gossip derived from Salley's fellow pris- 
oner the disaffected Creole Baudran, whom we are soon to meet. Gay- 
arre says that when Bienville "left Louisiana forever, although he was 
under the displeasure of the court, the colonists were loud in expressing 
their regrets." 



2l8 VIRGINIA HISTORICAL MAGAZINE 

discovered the place, and made attempt to settle therein, there 
were then pretty many English settled on both sides of the 
River Missi^ippi, and one Twenty Gun Ship lay in the River, 
what became of the Ship we did not hear, but we were in- 
formed that the English Inhabitants were all destroyed by the 
Natives by the Instigation of the French."' 

I now begin to speak of the strength of the Country, and 
by the best Account I cou'd gather I did not find, that there 
are above four Hundred and fifty effective Men of the Militia 
in all that Country, and not above one Hundred and fifty Sol- 
diers under pay in and about the Town of New Orleans, 'tis 
true they have Sundry Forts in which they keep some men, 
but they are so weak and despicable as not worth taking notice 
of, with regard to the Strengthening of the County, having in 
some of them only six men, in others Ten men, the strongest 
of all those places is at the Mouth of the Missi^ippi In which 
are thirty Men, and Fifty Leagues from thence is a Town 
called Mumvell" nine Leagues from the Mouth of a River of 
the same Name in which is a Garrison, that Consists of Seventy 
Soldiers. 

After I had been confined in close Prison above two Years, 
and all Expectation of being set at Liberty failing, I begun to 
think of making my Escape out of Prison, one of which I put 
in Practice, and which Succeeded in the following Manner. 
There was a certain French Man, who was born in that Coun- 
try, and had some time before sold his Rice to the Spaniards 
for which he was put in Prison, and it Cost him six Hundred 
Peices of Eight before he got clear. He being tired with the 
Misery and Oppression under which the poor Country People 

^* Fry comments: "If this be true it is most likely to be known in 
England or Jamaica : and a Proof of it would give the English a Right 
by Possession to the Southern part of the river as well as to the North- 
ern by King James the First's Charter to Virginia." 

While undoubtedly there were Carolina traders on the Mississippi 
as early as 1700 (the facts are collected in Surrey, The Commerce of 
Louisiana during the French Regime, Columbia University Studies, 
1917) the story of English in the Mississippi forty years before 1742, 
which Salley heard, was probably a tradition of the elder Daniel Coxe's 
expedition up that river in 1698. for which see Margry, Dccouvertes et 
etablissements, iv, 361, 395, Daniel Coxe in the preface to his Carolana, 
and his father's Memorial in Alvord, First Explorations, p. 248. As 
Fry knew Coxe's book, he evidently did not believe this part of it. 

*** Fry notes in the margin, "Mobile." 



VIRGINIANS ON THE OHIO AND MISSISSIPPI, 1 742 2ig 

Labour, formed a Design of removing his Family to South 
CaroHna. Which Design was discovered, and he was again 
put in Prison in the Dungeon, and made fast in Irons, and 
after a formal Tryal, he was condemned to be a Slave for Ten 
Years, besides the expence of seven Hundred peices of Eight. 
With this Miserable French Man I became intimate & familiar, 
and as he was an active man, and knew the Country he prom- 
ised, if I could help him off with his Irons, and we all got clear 
of the Prison, he would conduct us safe untill we were out 
of Danger. We then got a small file from a Soldier where- 
with to cut the Irons and on the 25'" day of October, 1744 we 
put our Design in Practice. While the French man was very 
busie in the Dungeon in cutting the Irons, we were as indus- 
trious without in breaking the Door of the Dungeon, and Each 
of us finished our Jobb at one Instant of time, which had 
held us for about six hours; by three of the Clock in the 
Morning with the help of a Rope which I had provided before- 
hand, we let our Selves down over the Prison Walls, and made 
our Escape*^ Two Miles from the Town that night, where we 
lay close for two days. We then removed to a place three 
Miles from the Town, where one of the good old Fryers of 
which I spoke before, nourished us four Days. On the Eighth 
Day after we made our Escape, we came to a Lake*^ seven 
Leagues from the Town but by this Time we had got a Gun 
and some Ammunition, the next Day we shot two large Bulls, 
and with their Hides made us a boat, in which we passed the 
Lake in the Night. We tied the Shoulder Blades of the Bulls 
to small sticks, which served us for paddles and passed a 
point, where there were thirteen men lay in wait for us, but 

■•^ Vaudreuil's despatch of 29 December, 1744 {Arch. Nat. Colonics, 
C" 28: 273) confirms this. Salley's Creole companion was one Bau- 
dran who sometime before had been arrested for robbery and was 
condemned to ten years in the galleys, but escaped to the Havana with 
the intention of making his way to Carolina and thence among the In- 
dians "of that Nation." He was, however, returned to New Orleans by 
the Spanish and there was imprisoned in irons (legs, hands and neck) 
until permission could be obtained to send him to France. After his 
escape with Salley he sent word to the Governor that his purpose was 
to enlist his friends among the Choctaws to intercede for his pardon, 
which, says Vaudreuil, "will be difficult to refuse because he is a brave 
and enterprising man, much beloved by the Indians, and if he shall ally 
himself with the enemies of France will be a dangerous enemy." 

*^ Lake Pontchartrain. 



220 VIRGINIA HISTORICAL MAGAZINE 

Thro' Mercy we escaped from them undiscovered. After we 
had gone by Water sixty miles we went on Shore, we left our 
Boat as a Witness of our Escape to the French. We trav- 
elled thirty miles by Land to the River Shoktare,*' where our 
French man's father lived. In this Journey we passed thro' a 
Nation of Indians, who were very kind to us, and Carried us 
over two large Bays." In this place we Tarried Two Months 
and ten Days in very great Danger, for search was made for 
us everywhere by Land and W^ater and Orders to Shoot us 
when found. Great Rewards were promised by the Governor 
to the King of the Indians (mentioned above) to take us, 
which he refused, and in the meantime was very kind by giving 
provisions and informing us of our Danger from time to time. 
After they had given over Searching for us, and we having 
got a large Periaugue and other necessary things for our voy- 
age, and on the 25th of January our French man and one 
Negro boy (which he took to wait on him) and another 
French man and we being all armed and well provided for 
our Voyage, we set off at a place called the belle Fountain 
(or in English fine Spring)*^ and Sailed fifty Leagues to the 
head of S'. Rose's Bay,^^ and there left our Vessel and trav- 
elled by Land Thirty Leagues to the Fork Indians,*' where the 
English trade. Then there were three with them, and there 

" Pearl River. The friendly aid of the Choctaws is an evidence of 
the relations Baudran had with them. 

** Bay St. Louis and Biloxi Bay. 

*^On D'Anville's map of Mobile and the adjacent coast (1732. repro- 
duced in Hamilton, Colonial Mobile, p. 166) "Belle Fontaine" is marked 
on the bay shore between Biloxi and the mouth of Pascagoula. On 
Bellin's Carte de la Louisiane ct dcs Pays voisins, 1750, it is marked 
"La basse Fontaine." The "Fontainbleau" of the modern map evidently 
indicates the site. 

*" The Santa Rosa Bay of the contemporary maps is now known, after 
the stream which drains into it, as "Choctawhatchee Bay" but the old 
name remains in "Santa Rosa Island," east of Pensacola. 

The strategy of Salley and his companion was to avoid the French 
at Mobile and at Fort Toulouse (Montgomery), and to strike as soon 
as possible one of the Carolina trading paths out of Savana Town 
(Fort Moore, opposite Augusta) which then traversed north Georgia 
and Alabama, by which they could, as they did, make their way to 
Charles Town. 

*" These were the "Lower Creeks" living in the fork between the 
Chattahoochie and Flint Rivers, with whom Carolina then maintained 
trading relations. 



VIRGINIANS ON THE OHIO AND MISSISSIPPI, I742 221 

we Stayed five Days. The Natives were to us kind and gen- 
erous, there we left the two French men and Negro boy, and 
on the tenth of February we set oflf and Travelled by Land 
up the River Giscaculfufa or Biscaculfufa,*^ one Hundred and 
thirty five Miles, passing several Indian Towns the Natives 
being very hospitable and kind, and came to one Finlas an 
Indian Trader, who lives among the Ugu Nation. On the 
first of March we left M" Finlas, and on the sixteenth we ar- 
rived at fort Augustus" in the Province of Georgia. On the 
nineteenth instant we left fort Augustus and on the first of 
April we arrived at Charles Town, and waited on the Gov- 
ernor,"' who examined us Concerning our Travels &c. and he 
detained us in Charles Town eighteen Days, and made us a 
present of eighteen pounds of their Money, which did no more 
than defray our Expences whilst in that Town. 

I had delivered to the Governor a Copy of my Journal, 
which when I asked again he refused to give me, but having 
obtained from him a Pass we went on board of a small Vessel 
bound for Virginia. On the Thirteenth of April, the same 
Day about two of the Clock we were taken by the French in 
Cape Roman and kept Prisoners till eleven of the Clock next 
Day, at which time the French after having robbed us of all 
the Provisions we had for our Voyage or Journey, put us 
into a Boat we being twelve men in Number, and so left us 
to the ]\Iercy of the Seas and Winds. 

On the fifteenth instant we arrived again at Charles Town*^ 

*® Neither of these names appear on the contemporary maps. The 
river was the Chattahoochie on which a Dutch map of "Florida" of 
1734 (followed by the map in Rapin, History of England, 1744) shows 
"Hogolegos" in the vicinity of Columbus. Ga. This was a village of the 
Yuchi (Handbook Am. Indians, ii, 1003) who were Salley's "Ugo 
Nation." 

" Augusta, on the Savannah River. 

"' He was James Glen, a Scot, who came to South Carolina as Gov- 
ernor in 1743. 

" The South Carolina Gazette, published at Charles Town, carried the 
following news item in its issue of April 15, 1745: 

"Capt. Norman in a small Schooner belonging to Mr. Hugh Cart- 
wright of this town and Messrs. George Ducat and Robert Dunston 
two of our Pilots with their boat, were taken on Friday last off Cape 
Remain in their Passage to Winyaw, by a French Privateer from Port 
Louis on St. Domingo, call'd L' Aventure, Capt. Martin Torres, who 
(after having plundered the Pilot Boat) gave Ducat a Pass in French 



222 VIRGINIA HISTORICAL MAGAZINE 

and were examined before the Governor concerning our being 
taken by the French. We were now detained three Days be- 
fore we could get another Pass from the Governor, we having 
destroyed the former, when we were taken by the French, and 
then were dismissed, being in a strange Place, far from Home, 
destitute of Friends, Cloathing, Money and Arms, and in that 
deplorable Condition had been obliged to undertake a Journey 
of five Hundred Miles, but a Gentleman, who was Commander 
of a Privateer, and then lay at Charles Town with whom we 
had discoursed several times, gave to each of us a Gun and 
a Sword, and would have given us Ammunition, but that he 
had but little. On the Eighteenth Day of April, we left Charles 
Town, the second time, and travelled by Land," and on the 
seventeenth Day of May, 1745 we arrived at my House, hav- 
ing been absent three years Two Months and one Day, from 
my family, having in that time by the nicest Calculation I am 
able to make, travelled by Land and Water four thousand six 
hundred and six Miles since I left my own House till I re- 
turned Home again. 

p John Peter Salley. 

not to be retaken by his concert, and put 12 English Prisoners on Board, 
with which he arriv'd last Night." 

Acknowledgment is made to Mr. A. S. Salley, Jr., for this further 
voucher of the good faith of our document. 

^ It seems probable that they followed the "Path to Virginia by way 
of Cape Fear," as marked on George Hunter's map of South Carolina 
in 1730. This map is reproduced in Bulletin No. 4 of the Historical 
Commission of South Carolina, 1917. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



" i HIMIIMIIM nil IMIP I'll 1^ 

017 136 354 8 ( 



